


Extra for Daily Reporter

by dulcebase



Category: Deadly Premonition | Red Seeds Profile
Genre: Gen, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Severe Spoilers, additional tags on chapters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-07
Updated: 2015-12-07
Packaged: 2018-05-05 12:29:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5375234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dulcebase/pseuds/dulcebase
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of drabbles originally posted to a roleplay blog.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All of these were originally posted to my roleplay blog, biilateral on tumblr.
> 
> No additional warnings. This one's post-canon.

Betweenthe pale yellow sodium light and the murky glass of the window there is a sheet of cool summer rain. Between the layers of glass, there is a pocket of air, a muffling sheet between the room and the city without. Between his eyes, lying on a barren bed in a barren bedroom, the man who used to be Francis York Morgan is awake.

The rain beats patterns into the street, floors below, the roof, floors above, and as the city, though sleepless, is awash with silence, it is nostalgia he feels in waves, the ebb and flow barring him from sleeping, escaping into the white void of the dreamscape, the endless maze of ivory rooms that filled the hole where cryptic nightmares once sunk their teeth into his mind. He cannot tell if he prefers the safety of the emptiness.

On summer nights when the rain is ceaseless and his body cannot rest, his thoughts wander back to the forest, not the pristine, white one where he dreams now, nor the red hell from which he has escaped, but that which he caught only glimpses of, lush and green and populated entirely by goddesses.

She was one of them, of course, the last, regretted Goddess, his wording on her damning her as much as his negligence. Francis Zach Morgan does not blame himself for the death of Emily Wyatt, but cannot ignore the heavy weight of his inability, the trigger freezing beneath his fingertips. But then, she had been the purest goddess of them all, divine not just in her beauty, but her strength, infinitely stronger than all the women before her and all the men, himself included, who could not do what had to be done. 

When her name floats to the top of his mind, he rises, walks through the darkened room into an equally bare bathroom, the light refracted from beyond the shower door just enough to illuminate his face in the glass.

It is an odd thing to look in the mirror and see a face you cannot comprehend is yours, to see a face you thought was alien for so long now identified as yours. Each time he looks, it is as if he sees his reflection for the first time, as if his very reflection is an alien image that he can’t comprehend. 

The line was fine, always fine, where one ended and the other began, which was which and who was who, murky and muddled. The mirror no longer lies, and his words don’t twist before they reach his ears, but the view is no easier and the syllables no less foreign on his tongue. 

Utterly ridiculous.

Like bandaging an old scar because you forgot you even had it.

He waits a few moments to let the faucet run into the drain before splashing his face with water. Cold, and he does not wipe off the drips clinging to two-day-old stubble, only runs his hands (  _his_ hands? ) over the plane of it.

The lines were fine, fine like the old scar bisecting the left side of his face. Feeling it now is different than it ever was, now painfully obvious. How he had managed to hide it for so long… well, that was the Tree’s doing, the words still echoing in his mind -  _“ how did you escape the red room? ”_ \- and the implications of it chilling to the bone. But then, there wasn’t suffering, there was only…  _York_.

His hands are still wet when he leaves the bathroom, when crossing the barren room bathed in streaks of orange light, when falling unceremoniously on the bed,  when they settle somewhere between the pillow and the back of his head.

“ … it’s been a while, hasn’t it? ”

A year, a year since Greenvale and a year since he’s said a word like this, into open air. The last time he had encountered the Tree, he wouldn’t speak to anyone but him for a year, but this time, he’d talk to anyone  _but_ him for the same frame. …bookends, almost. Closure. Wrapped up in a nice, neat little package. Zach can feel the corners of his mouth quirking without his trying.

“ York… I hope you can still hear me, even if you can’t respond. I know you’re there. You said you were always with me. Don’t you remember, York? ”

It almost feels silly, now, stupid. Yet he can’t remember bringing a hand to his neck, thumb pressed against the pendant’s smooth center. … _Emily._  Of course. 

“ Did she take my advice, York? I know you’re usually not one to come out and say how you feel. I hope you don’t mind my trying to help you out. Sometimes you just need a little push.  
“ … You, and Emily, and Anna, Becky, Diane, Carol, Thomas… All of you are together, aren’t you? I’m almost a little jealous. ”

Almost, not quite. Thinking about it – it’s bittersweet. Being alone isn’t so bad, once the fear is closed out of the mind.

“ …That’s all for now, York. Maybe I’ll talk to you again sometime. ”

No response echoes through the barren room. No response was expected. The silence is a comfort, a comfort and pain.  
  
When Francis Zach Morgan sleeps, he dreams of white trees and endless rooms, connected through doors with no walls, hallways with no boundaries. He does not move from the room, only sit in the silence and watch the ivory leaves fall to mirrored floors.  
  
Illuminated by the pale yellow sodium lights, the rain patters on against the foggy window, a ceaseless rhythm and quiet melody filling the emptiness. There is no malice in the rain. There is only cleansing, healing. Grace.

                                       _…and Grace will lead me home._


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Post-Canon this time. No warnings.

It's a two day drive back to Washington from Seattle. For the first time in twenty-six years, Francis Zach Morgan is completely alone.

 It should bother him. It should, at least more than it does.

           He calls Bob Abrahams the day he checks out of the Great Deer Yard. Short conversation.  _“ Checked in with Seattle. The reports will be in when my laptop gets repaired. I’m headed back now, ”_  he says.  _“ There’s a case that might pique your interest if you check by the Portland field office, ”_  his superior replies. _“ Is that an assignment? ” “ Only if you want to take it, ”_ Abrahams says.  _“ I’m heading back, ”_ Zach says, and he hangs up shortly after.

             Washington is not thrilled to see him return. Will not be.

             He thinks about this speeding down I-70 at 85. Knows what’s going to come of it. If the people of Greenvale saw a difference when York left, it’ll be a heel-face turn to the people he knows at the Bureau. Not to mention the cost – a single murder that happened to fit the M.O. of a wild goose chase leading to an additional seven deaths, and the factor of severe police corruption only goes so far. Should he put in what really happened - the Otherworld, the Red Tree, the government testing in the 50′s, Kaysen - the Red Seed Murders, case closed, will be locked in a file deep in the basement with all the other oddities and unexplained events and he’ll be put in for another psych eval that he doesn’t know if he can even pass without York by his side. Doesn’t care about tarnishing an already tarnished reputation. Francis Zach Morgan could be the best damn agent they ever had, but that doesn’t mean a thing. Spotless records can look soiled to a scrutinizing eye.

             The windows are up and there’s music blasting through his speakers and not a trace of cigarette smoke in the car. Both hands on the wheel. He drives through a thunderstorm passing through Ohio. A curtain of rain, thick, thunder cracking the dark sky in flashes of blinding brilliance.

             When he passes it, he feels freer, somehow. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> pre-canon. mental health discussion.

so maybe this time you can go back to when everything was stark and white and pure like new linens and hospital rooms and snow, and maybe this time when you close your eyes it won’t be red, red red red red red like blood and and fear and falling leaves. maybe this time you can close your eyes and feel safe and feel the rush of sleep like a heavy curtain, and maybe this time you won’t be terrified at what happens behind your eyelids in the darkest parts of the night and maybe you can breathe again. maybe this time you don’t feel the blankets restricting you like vines, red vines, red red red red red red red. 

        so maybe this time you won’t be screaming inside your mind.

_shh. it’s okay. i’m here. i’m here with you._

          so maybe this time the shadows will have faces and you place them with the names, maybe this time you can remember more than flashes and glimpses and echoing words, sounding out in your mind like death knells. so maybe this time it doesn’t hurt.

_it doesn’t have to hurt. don’t think about that now._

           so maybe this time you can open your mouth and more will come out than silence. so maybe this time you can forget and memories don’t come flooding back unannounced, snapshots and still-frames and burned film with missing pieces and no context, and it won’t stop mid-reel and flicker to dust and static and empty frames that sting more than the hazy images, and maybe this time the empty space isn’t blocking out what hurts most without blocking all of the pain. maybe this time you can breathe and your heart will stop racing.

_do you feel that? it’s my heartbeat, too. i’m you, and you’re me and i’m here.  
i’ll always be here, i promise. you don’t have to be afraid as long as i’m here._

           so maybe this time you can remember anything at all. maybe this time everything is quiet and calm and soft and green, maybe this time there is no red never red nothing red and there is no pain and there is no fear. maybe this time there is no color, and everything is soft and clean and white. maybe this time you can close your eyes and feel peace and feel nothing at all. maybe this time you can be removed, maybe this time you don’t have to look and maybe this time you wake up and you’re not you anymore, but you are, and maybe this time you wake up stronger and far away from everything else. maybe this time you are safe.

_it’s time to sleep, zach._

maybe this time friendship doesn’t feel like a crutch.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> post-canon. mental health discussion. abstract gore. heavy themes of disassociation.

             so that’s what it’s like to wake up in a stranger’s bed in a stranger’s body with a stranger’s face and a stranger’s name and to not know that the tired eyes staring back in the mirror aren’t a stranger’s anymore. so that’s what it’s like when the bags under the eyes don’t look real and the reflection is wrong, and maybe for once it’s right and you’re right and everything is right now and you’re you.

                                                             so that’s what it’s like.

            so they didn’t tell you that healing hurts, that hearts get ripped apart but the needle stings and the thread aches when they’re pulled through to stitch it back together, that scabs are messy and unfinished, that opening a wound just leaves a scar. so they didn’t tell you that the pain means it’s working. so they didn’t tell you that loneliness stings.

            so they didn’t tell you it would hurt, but a good hurt, a wholesome hurt, and the pain lets you know you’re alive and the scars let you know it happened. 

            so they didn’t tell you that every ache of your healing heart would feel like blooming flowers, not like bullet holes.

            so they didn’t tell you that happiness and sadness are a wicked couple.

       and it’s a melancholy pain but the stranger’s face and the stranger’s life is yours and every memory is bittersweet and every future is blinding white and life — 

                                                                                                                   — life is  _beautiful._


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> pre-canon. violent imagery. head trauma. eye trauma.

in dreams, all the mirrors are shattered.

in dreams, everything is red  _red red redredredredred **red**_  and he’s walking half-blind.

in dreams, everything’s a symbol and everything has meaning but he doesn’t know – he doesn’t know what it is or what it means or why - never  **why**.

                 dreams are just a puzzle upon waking.

in dreams, the room never changes.

in dreams, the walls are forests and the carpets are leaves, and everything is always  _red_.

in dreams, there are the vines,  _red_ vines,  _always **red**_ , crimson ropes that change each time; on the doors, on the ground, wrapping around the inexplicable fireplace – and then there were  _those_ dreams, the dreams where the chairs are black and dark wood and well-cushioned and the vines wrap around his limbs and creep up his neck and he wakes amazed that he’s still breathing.

and the chair beside him, out of his view from his blind left eye, is always,  _always **empty**_.

in dreams, there’s blood dripping down his temple and pooling in the shell of his ear. 

in dreams, they grip his head like a vice, and he can feel them growing. 

in dreams, there is no pain, but there is the sensation – the knowledge that pain should be felt and that it should hurt him – should kill him – but he’s alive and subconscious and the vines creep out in the corner of his vision and suddenly the blindness makes so much sense.

in nightmares, his skull cracks and the vines take over.  
  
        in the mornings, he’s still trying, unfazed, to figure out what it  **means**.


End file.
